When we left Nedda, half of her little itinerant theatrical troupe, meaning her husband, Canio, and their colleague Beppe, had gone off for a frinedly drink with some of the locals of the village where theye arrived as Act I opened, leaving her to ponder her situation. Tonight we're going to hear two-minute samples of the baritone characters with whom she's about to have dramatic encounters.

The first isn't new to us; it's Tonio, the troupe's hunchback clown, who stayed behind, he said, to groom the donkey. We've heard an odd, unpleasant line or two from him, but mostly we know his voice from the Prologue, as we've resampled above.

BONUS: 3 (OR 4) VERSIONS WE HAVEN'T HEARD
As currently planned (these things are of course always subject to change till they're actually done), we're going to be hearing the complete Prologue performances -- from 1917, 1958, and 1992, respectively -- from which these excerpts are drawn on Sunday. I wasn't going to identify the performers until then, but I'd already prepared that info, and I hate to just delete it. Note that the performance is different from the others in several ways, most obviously some of the notes sung. We'll talk about that on Sunday.

When NEDDA finishes her Ballatella, she is startled to discover TONIO watching. She tells him sharply that she thought he had gone.

TONIO: It's the fault of your singing.
Fascinated, I reveled in it.NEDDA [mockingly]: Ha! Ha! So much poetry!TONIO: Don't laugh, Nedda!NEDDA: Go! Go off to the inn!TONIO: I know well that I am deformed,
I am contorted,
that I arouse only scorn and horror.
Yet my thoughts know dreams, desires,
a beating of the heart.
When so disdainfully you pass me by,
you don't know what tears
grief forces out of me!
Because, in spite of myself,
I've suffered enchantment,
I've been conquered by love!
[Moving closer to her]
Oh! let me tell you --NEDDA [interrupting]: That you love me?
Ha ha ha ha!

The Nedda-Tonio scene deteriorates into pretty much total mayhem, but Nedda succeeds in warding Tonio off, at which point over the wall dashes the dashing Silvio, whom Nedda is startled to see at this hour. After some back and forth, Silvio asks Nedda whether she really means to live forever amid all this anxiety.

I originally thought we'd hear only the earlier of Rolando Panerai's recordings, with Maria Callas as Nedda, but it's kind of a pokey affair, and I thought we should hear the later one as well, with Herbert von Karajan's gorgeous accompaniment (as in the Nedda-Tonio scene). So then I thought I would throw in the Lisitsian-Yakovenko recording (dubbed, I'm afraid, from my Soviet-pressed LP copy).

SILVIO [approaching NEDDA sadly and tenderly]:
And amid this anxiety you'll live forever?
Nedda! Nedda!
[He takes her hand and leads her downstage.]
Decide my fate, Nedda! Nedda, stay!
You know that the festival comes
to an end and everyone will leave tomorrow.
Nedda! Nedda!
And when you say that you will be gone from here,
what will become of me, of my life?NEDDA [moved]: Silvio!SILVIO: Nedda, Nedda, answer me!
If it's true that you never loved Canio,
if it's true that you hate this wandering,
and the profession you ply,
if your immense love isn't just a fancy,
this night let's leave!
Fly, fly with me!